Seoda Shows promotions has brought a host of exciting live music to Limerick city in recent years. After two great years at Dolan’s the birthday celebrations will see New York’s Hamell On Trial play his Coochtown album in full and Dublin’s Jape will launch his new album, ‘The Chemical Sea’. Limerick Post caught up with Richie Egan (aka Jape) rehearsing for the upcoming tour.
by Eric FitzGerald
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SPEAKING from his new home in Malmo, Sweden, Richie Egan tells Limerick Post that rehearsals are well underway for the launch of his fifth album, ‘The Chemical Sea’. The album was written and recorded by Egan in Malmo, a town with a very small music scene and very few distractions. If you want live music, head for Copenhagen or Stockholm, he tells me.
“When I was writing the record I was pretty much alone here in Malmo and sending tracks back to Glen (fellow member Glen Keating). I live in an industrial area. In Dublin I would meet people all the time but over here I was able to focus on the tracks a lot more. It’s a good base to work on music because there isn’t a lot to do”, he laughs.
The result of Egan’s Nordic exile is ‘The Chemical Sea’, a cohesive, cool synth led melodic dark pop groover. It is the Jape record Richie is most satisfied with. The album is his “most coherent record, it doesn’t change too much and has a sonic sound.”
Part of the reason the album sounds so great is down to the mixing of David Wrench who was behind the mixing of the FKA Twigs, Caribou, and Jungle records last year. Egan says that David was able to wrench that extra 20 per cent from the original recordings.
“David is the only person in the world I would have trusted to have the skill, practice and taste to mix it. He nailed the shit out of the mixes. It took a little longer than we wanted to wait but was worth it. The results really good. We were lucky to get him, about a month later he was ‘Mr. Hot Shit’”
On the album, the track ‘Ribbon Ribbon Ribbon’ features his friend Conor O’Brien of Villagers. The track was not intended for the album but it was too good to leave behind.
“The track was written on an acoustic guitar. Conor brought over a drum machine and we jammed with it and had a great evening making it. It wasn’t supposed to be on the album but we got David Wrench to mix it to hear what he would do with it. He did a fantastic job so we stuck it on the album.”
Talking about Richie’s own musical tastes leads us into the conflict of interest that music streaming sites such as Spotify have for any musician and music fan and Richie admits he is a music fan as well as a creative.
“Everyone in Sweden has Spotify. I’m getting really into following artists on Spotify if they have made playlists of their favourite music, you hear some pretty cool stuff that way. From a consumer of music point of view its an amazing service to be able to delve into that music for a tenner a month. For an artist, it’s debatable, but I’m a consumer too.”
By way of example of what artists make from streaming sites, Richie checked his latest streaming listenership figures. It is a very encouraging 70,000 plays in that week. That amount of exposure on radio would easily sustain a career, (for example, BBC radio pay approximately £50 per play). Japes receipt for 70,000 plays on Spotify is $580.
“The royalty rates are not that good but I played a gig in Stockholm last week and there were people at the gig who knew the songs and knew the lyrics which was pretty mind-blowing to me.” That was precisely because of Spotify, as Jape have not released music in Sweden yet.
Ritchie is philosophical about the current streaming debate and with an extensive tour and a fine new album to play, he is upbeat and looking forward to playing in Limerick.
“What are you making music for? You can only sit on one armchair at a time. As long as I can continue to make music, I’m happy, you know. We’ll bring vinyl on the road and people still buy vinyl.”
Hamell On Trial celebrates the fifteenth anniversary of his ‘Coochtown’ album at Kasbah Social Club, Dolan’s this Friday February 20. Jape with support from The Mighty Stef play Kasbah Social Club, Dolan’s this Saturday February 21.
